


Five Stages

by SpaceKase



Category: Sally Face (Video Games)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Child Murder, Gen, Murder, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide, Supernatural Elements, sadfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-18
Updated: 2019-10-18
Packaged: 2020-12-21 15:01:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,731
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21076832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SpaceKase/pseuds/SpaceKase
Summary: One might think it isn't possible to go through all five stages of grief in the span one night.Then again, this is no ordinary night, and Sal is no ordinary person.





	Five Stages

**Author's Note:**

> I don't remember what made me start this, but I finished it earlier today and wanted to share. So here we are!
> 
> As always, I've done my best to tag any potentially triggering material, but in case I've missed something, please, PLEASE let me know.
> 
> (It's been a while since I played Episode 4; my memories of it are a bit fuzzy, so I don't think this follows canon PRECISELY.) 
> 
> (Also, I thhhhhhINK that the 'five stages of grief' thing doesn't work exactly like this? I believe it's been debunked? Which would make sense to me, since grief is such a deeply personal thing and everyone goes about it differently, but take that with a grain of salt.)

**Denial**

He thinks it's a joke at first. There's no _way _he's really reading those texts on his phone, and it shows in how he responds. One number, twice; another, three times. It takes too long to say what he wants to.

The words he reads from Larry's phone don't tell him he's joking. Shaking his head, Sal types out another response. His feet move as his thumbs press the numbers, as though they've all got minds of their own. 

_This isn't funny, Larry. _It's the one thought that keeps running through Sal's mind. He's in disbelief; Larry knows better than to joke about something like this, right?

It's raining heavily when he steps outside his front door. The storm's finally arrived, he absently notes, as he sets off. 

At some point, he's no longer walking; he's running as fast as his damnably short legs can carry him. _No, _he keeps thinking. It's the one thought that keeps repeating over and over in his head. 

_No no no no no no nonononono--_

Something tells Sal to run past the building. Whatever has..._happened_...is _going_ to happen...it won't be in the basement. 

The tree that holds Larry's treehouse, which Sal has always thought was comforting in its strong silence, now reaches for the sky with long, gnarled black limbs, looking like dead fingers disappearing into the clouds. 

There's a note taped to the treehouse's ladder. With shaking fingers, Sal takes it. 

_NO NO NO NO_

It's all there, in Larry's messy scrawl. Sal would recognize that handwriting anywhere.

He squeezes his eyes shut before blinking them rapidly, uncertain whether it's rain or teardrops he's trying to free himself from.

He climbs up, not caring how slippery the planks of wood are beneath his fingers and sneakers. What meets him when he looks inside freezes him to the core, more than the wild wind and rain outside could ever hope to.

Larry Johnson lays there, eyes closed, bottle of whiskey loose in one hand, a bottle of unidentifiable pills spilled a short distance from his feet.

Sal recognizes it; he'd once walked in on his father in the same way.

The difference is that his father had still been breathing. Larry isn't; his chest is perfectly still, no matter how much Sal pushes down on it. He feels no heartbeat; there is no pulse under the marble-cold skin of his throat or wrists.

It all hits him, like a punch in the gut. He doubles over Larry's body, choking on his own sobs. 

He hadn't made it in time.

"No..._no_..."

**Anger**

It's no easy task, carrying Larry's body across his shoulders with one hand while he climbs down the ladder with the other. But Sal manages; with each step he takes towards the building's backyard, his sneakers get more and more stuck in the mud, almost as though the earth is trying to drag him down. 

He sets Larry's body against the back of the brick wall for the time being; he makes his way back to the basement door, which Larry and Lisa gave him a key to many, many years ago. When he leaves, he has a shovel with him; it was usually saved for springtime, when Lisa would futilely try her hand at gardening. Her best efforts and pure love hadn't been enough to bring life back to the dead soil that surrounded Addison Apartments, but that had never stopped her from trying.

Whether she'd forgotten it in the basement before she moved in with his father, or left it there specifically for Larry...

_God_...how is she going to take the news that her son is dead? _How am I going to tell her?_

Sal gulps and stops trying to keep water out of his eyes. He digs for goodness knows how long; deep enough to hold the body of a six-foot-tall, two-hundred-thirty-pound man, but not enough that Sal can't pull himself out when he's finished.

_He sure didn't make this convenient,_ he thinks to himself, completely without humor. _He didn't think _any_ of this through_, he continued to think as he carried Larry's body to the grave and shoveled pile after pile of dirt into it.

_He didn't _think_...just enough to warn _me_..._Sal's teeth grit as his thoughts continue, spiralling down and down. _Didn't he realize what he was giving up? He was only twenty-three, couldn't he see how much more he had left to live?_

Fresh tears well up in his left eye; he clenches his fists so tight that he isn't sure he isn't drawing blood. That he's going to miss his stepbrother and best friend since high school can't begin to cover what he's feeling right now; it's similar to walking a familiar path in the night, only to trip over something that wasn't there before.

And illogical as it is, the more Sal is left alone with his thoughts, the angrier and angrier he becomes at the one who'd changed the path.

_Why? _is the only thing crossing his mind right now. _How could he?_

How could he throw away his future as an artist? How could he do that to his mother after everything she'd already been through?

How could he do that to_ him _after everything _he'd_ been through?

Ostensibly Sal knows he's being selfish and insensitive, but so caught up in his fresh anger, it's what he demands of Larry when he confronts his ghost. That the glowing specter of his best friend and stepbrother is so calm about everything only makes him angrier. 

Even after they work out what they need to do, Sal holds onto that bit of anger as he goes to see Todd. He can deal with it at a better time.

**Bargaining**

The cult is nothing if not efficient. It seems like there's no place in the building that hasn't been touched by their darkness.

The beginning of the night is still fresh in Sal's mind, but now that there's so much for him to do, he can put his mind to it. 

_Play this one riff, _he thinks at each pillar. _Just play these few notes, and everything will be okay. _

Of course it isn't true; logically he knows it. But it's what keeps him sane in the moment, just saying it to himself over and over. _Just one more thing, and it'll all be over. Then you can go back home, crawl under your blankets, and cry yourself to sleep. You can call Dad and Lisa tomorrow morning and deal with everything then. _

Sal tells himself this over and over in order to get himself through each task. Each time it covers up what he's really thinking.

_If there's anyone out there listening...anyone at all...I'll give anything to have him back. I'll do anything. _

_Please, _he thinks as he opens the door to Terrance Addison's apartment for the first time. 

_Please, _he thinks as he witnesses the monstrosity before him.

_Please,_ he thinks as he wields his guitar, his only weapon and source of protection for the ensuing battle.

_Please..._

The quiet after the storm is the only moment of peace he gets that night. 

It's here and how that Sal realizes that whoever is out there doesn't care about him. There's no one listening.

He's all alone now.

**Depression**

It's in the blinding white void with the entity and Terrance's spirit before him that Sal finally allows himself to dwell on every miserable fucking thing that's happened this night. 

This had been the final year before the college students next to David graduated.

Chug and Maple had gotten pregnant in the summer after they'd finished high school; despite the disadvantages, Maple had chosen to have her baby, and Chug had been there every step of the way. Things weren't easy for them, but they now had a beautiful baby daughter who would be turning four soon.

Things had been going so well. His father hadn't had a drink in five years; Lisa had healed from her sickness. They'd gotten married, making the familial connection Sal had to the Johnsons official. His best friend was now his brother; which kid in the history of human kind hadn't wanted their best friend to be related to them? Larry had recovered from his father leaving, and welcomed both Henry and Sal to his family with open arms. His father and Lisa were still madly in love; anyone who spoke to them for only a minute could see how good they were for each other.

Larry had been about to move in with Sal, Todd, and Neil.

_Everything was going great..._Sal thinks as he stares at the knife in his hands. _Everyone was happy._

The metal of the knife is shiny. The ominous gleam coming off the silver becomes too much for Sal to bear, so he closes his eye. 

_I can't do this..._

Right then Sal doesn't want to do anything, say anything, go anywhere. If he could only curl up in this void for the rest of eternity and die, maybe that would help.

He considers using the knife on himself. It won't help his family or neighbors, but it will sure as Hell help him. At least then he won't feel like this anymore.

It looks like, once again, he's given no choice. Because when he opens his eye, he's back on the ground floor of Addison Apartments, just in time to watch Mrs. Gibson take the chain down from her door for the first time Sal has ever seen and promptly fall into the lobby.

**Acceptance**

He knows there's something wrong the minute she opens her mouth. 

She asks him for help.

He knows Mrs. Gibson pretty well by now. He knows that the prideful, stubborn old woman would never, ever ask him for help.

_It's making me see what I want to see_...he realizes as his heart sinks.

_There's no other way out of this._

Her eyes are glazed in a way that's nothing like her usually piercing gaze as he steps over her. _They were right..._

Sal crouches, eyeing the angle her head is tilted in. It's just enough to expose her vulnerable throat.

Sal aims the knife downwards with shaking hands, noting exactly where he needs to put it. 

He closes his eyes and plunges down, trying to make it quick.


End file.
